Hanzell winemaker Bob Sessions dies

Winemaker Bob Sessions, right, with his wife Jean Arnold at the Hanzell Vineyards property in Sonoma shortly after they were married. (Photo: Craig Lee/The Chronicle, 2003)

Bob Sessions, who presided over some of California’s most noteworthy Chardonnay and Pinot Noir for three decades, died Tuesday.

Sessions, 82, had been suffering from Alzheimer’s disease for at least a decade, although it was revealed only in 2012 when his wife, Jean Arnold Sessions, disclosed his condition. Toward the end of his life, Sessions could remember few details about his long career in California wineries — but what a career it was.

After an early tutelage during the 1960s and early 1970s at Mayacamas Vineyards, Souverain and Stag’s Leap Wine Cellars — three of the era’s defining wineries — Sessions was tapped in 1973 to take over for founding winemaker Brad Webb at Hanzell Vineyards.

By that point Hanzell, high above the town of Sonoma, was already legendary in California. Founded in 1957 by former ambassador James Zellerbach, it was a tribute to the best nature of Burgundy’s two noble grapes, which captivated Zellerbach and drove him to find somewhere in California to make Pinot Noir and Chardonnay with an equal level of finesse. That continued even after the estate was sold, twice, landing in 1975 in the hands of the de Brye family, which controls it today.

When Sessions took over, it was his duty to preside over what already was a significant legacy. Without wavering, he maintained Hanzell’s intensely structured and long-lived style of wine — Chardonnays, for instance, that were still fresh and young after decades. Later he would also become president of the winery.

This consistency of Hanzell wines remains today.

In 1999, Sessions received an additional tribute for his work — a vineyard block at Hanzell was named after him. This was a reflection, in part, of his long work to carefully replant the estate’s original vineyards, using the same cuttings and methods with which its 46 acres had long been farmed.

Jean Arnold, as she is known today, met Sessions when she was hired as general manager of Hanzell. Sessions’ first wife died in 2000, and he later married Arnold. Together they would face one of the winery’s greatest challenges: ridding its cellar of a compound, TCA, that causes so-called cork taint. TCA’s presence impacted the quality of Hanzell wines over several vintages.

Sessions, who made the wine at Hanzell until 2001 and moved to a winemaker emeritus position the following year, helped Arnold to clean the facility and to convince the wine trade that the crisis had passed. Hanzell’s reputation soon rebounded. Today, under the eye of Arnold, who took over as the winery’s president in 2002, and winemaker Michael McNeill, it is again making some of California’s most distinctive wines.

Sessions is survived by his wife, and by two children, Sarah and Benjamin. A public memorial is planned June 8. (Update: Winery now says the memorial will take place “in June.”)